Someone’s Daughter had its world premiere at the Fantasia Film Festival 2026, and it is the kind of film that shifts the tone of a festival hard. This is a French Canadian production, part of the Quebec cinema that Fantasia tends to spotlight and promote year after year. We went in cold, a first-time watch for everybody, and what we found is a movie that plays much quieter than its logline suggests.
The setup is simple on paper. Sam is a criminal defense attorney who, through circumstances beyond her control, ends up stranded in a remote corner of the Eastern Townships in Quebec. She is not alone.
She is out there with Paul, a man she once defended against assault charges roughly fifteen years earlier. The two of them have to work together in the wilderness to find their way back to civilization. The catch is that the further they go, the less certain Sam becomes that Paul was actually innocent of the crime he was acquitted of.
Arthur had been curious about this one from the jump.
I was very intrigued because of the way that it is described.
He said, though he also flagged the obvious risk: a premise like this either lands or it falls apart in the execution. “It could just be very poorly done if it’s not executed well.” Fair worry. Good news is the film mostly earns its description.
A slow burn, and we mean slow
Let’s set expectations before you buy a ticket. Someone’s Daughter is described as a thriller, but that word does a lot of lifting here. This is a very slow burn. It is a quiet film, quiet despite the circumstances the characters are stuck in, and a lot of it hinges on performance and on the small interactions between two people who only have each other to play off of.
We would not call it a thriller in the twist-and-turn sense. It feels more like a darker drama. Most of the story reads pretty clearly as it moves, and there are not many big surprises waiting for you. That is the honest knock on it.
Maybe I would have preferred for it to be something a little bit more ambiguous than it was.
Meaghan said, and you can feel that wish sitting under the whole review. The reveal, when it lands, lands late, near the end, and it is not going to shock you. Still, we understand the choice. Given the story she is telling, there is a real case for making sure the audience knows exactly where the director stands. No ambiguity, on purpose.
Two people, one wilderness
Sam is played by Pascale Bussières, a French Canadian actress who has been working for a long time and is genuinely fantastic here. She is so good. Paul is played by François Arnaud, who a lot of people know now thanks to a certain hockey show that got very popular in the last year or so (Heated Rivalry, if you were wondering).
We will note for the record that some of us loved him well before that. “I knew he was hot before that,” Meaghan said, and she has receipts: he was in The Borgias back in the day, and he was in a supernatural horror show called Midnight, Texas that only lasted for two seasons on NBC. That one leaned a little more fun than scary, and it got cancelled, which still stings.
The only other face you really see is Peter Outerbridge, a very well-known actor who shows up in a small but important role right at the beginning. Beyond that, this is essentially a two-hander. “Very secluded, two people,” as Arthur put it, and that is the whole engine of the film.
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The setting does half the work
The movie was shot in the Eastern Townships, and the nature out there basically becomes the setting, the mood, and a third character all at once. The cinematography is stunning. These two are trying to claw their way out of the wild, and the wild is beautiful the entire way through, which creates this strange tension where the thing that might kill you is also the thing you cannot stop looking at.
Pair that backdrop with two strong leads who only have each other, and the film ends up feeling excellently made even when the plot is not surprising you. That is a real compliment. A lot of two-handers fall apart when the story goes quiet. This one holds.
Clever writing that trusts you
The script is smart in a way that is easy to miss. It layers in quick bits of character development without lingering on them. You get a fast explanation, just enough, and then it moves on.
It’s just enough type of thing.
Arthur said, and that is exactly the rhythm.
There are little indications about why Sam is honestly very good at surviving out there, dropped in and left alone for you to catch. Same with Paul. There are offhand lines about him running triathlons, which quietly explains why he is in the shape he is in without stopping the movie to announce it.
(We have also, for the record, seen François Arnaud shirtless in a hockey show recently, so the triathlon detail tracks.) Small, not always important, but they answer the questions you would otherwise be asking. Good exposition, basically, done with a light hand.
Under all of it there is a real exploration of a woman who defended a man accused of doing something to another woman, and now has to sit with that. Not all of it is spelled out in dialogue. You can just watch the process happen on Bussières’ face as the movie goes. We thought it was intelligently done.
There is one thing we will keep to ourselves. Arthur wanted to know how the two of them end up stranded in the first place, and Meaghan would not budge.
That’s a spoiler. I don’t wanna give it away.
Arthur, for the record, did not believe her. If you are that desperate, the online synopsis apparently gives away more than it should, which is its own kind of crime.
Meaghan’s verdict, and a plea for a release
So where does it land? Meaghan is sitting at a 7.5, which is high for this podcast, and she knows it. The performances, the backdrop, and the writing carry it that far. Part of it, she admitted, might be about watching a film like this as a woman, given the subject matter it is dealing with. You do not need to see everything on screen to be affected by it, and this is a film that proves that.
Arthur has not seen it yet, but he is still on board.
You didn’t reveal too much that I don’t want to see it, but you also gave me enough that I do want to see it.
That is the sweet spot for a review, and it is roughly where we want to leave you too.
One catch: this was a world premiere, so a wide release is not locked in yet. We are very much hoping it gets picked up, at least in our area, and ideally nationally so more of you can actually watch it. “Someone, please do it,” Arthur said. Consider that our official request.